Mumbai-based online marketplace for wedding venues and vendors, Weddingz.in, has raised nearly $1 million (Rs 6.8 crore) from Singularity Ventures, a person close to the development told Techcircle. Existing investor Sixth Sense Ventures also participated in the round.
Weddingz.in founder and CEO Sandeep Lodha, however, declined to comment on the fund-raise.
In February last year, Weddingz.in, run by Mumbai-based L-Fast Brands Pvt Ltd, had raised an undisclosed amount in pre-Series A funding from consumer-centric venture fund Sixth Sense Ventures.
In December 2015, it had raised $1 million in angel funding from a group of investors, including Google India’s managing director Rajan Anandan, film-makers Zoya Akhtar, Reema Kagti and Ruchi Narain, fashion designer Ritu Kumar's son Amrish Kumar, and Ambit Private Wealth CEO Hrishikesh Parandekar.
Launched in January 2015 by Lodha, Weddingz.in is a technology-enabled wedding planning platform that simplifies the process of finding and booking services at best prices. It provides wedding venue recommendations, and also connects users with wedding service providers such as photographers, makeup and mehendi artists and planners. It started its operations from Mumbai and is now present in 12 cities, including Delhi, Bangalore and Goa.
Other deals in sector
A bunch of startups in the wedding planning space have emerged in the last two years. The market for wedding-related services is estimated to be worth $40 billion in India, according to US-based venture capital firm CerraCap Ventures. Some of these ventures have also secured external funding.
In August 2016, Delhi-based online wedding planner ShaadiSaga raised an undisclosed amount in a pre-Series A round from ah! Ventures, People Group’s Anupam Mittal and other investors. FreeCharge’s Kunal Shah and Sandeep Tandon, Dheeraj Jain of Redcliffe Capital and Rohit Chokhani of White Unicorn Ventures were among the other angel investors in the round.
In April, Mumbai-based Sitara Digital Ventures Pvt. Ltd, which runs wedding solutions portal The Wedding Brigade, raised Rs 4 crore (around $600,000) in pre-Series A funding led by Blume Ventures. The same month, Wedwise Consultants Pvt. Ltd raised seed funding from StartUp Equity Partners.
In March, media house NDTV entered this segment with the launch of wedding solutions platform Bandbaajaa.com.
In February, Hyderabad-based With Ease Technologies India Pvt. Ltd, which operates wedding services provider AppilyEver.com, raised $400,000 in funding led by Varun Aggarwal, founder and COO of Univariety.
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